ABSTRACT
Civil Society Activism under Authoritarian Rule: A Comparative Perspective provides readers with new theoretical and empirical insights into the relationship between civil society activism and authoritarian or liberal-authoritarian regimes. In the traditional literature on civil society, much is usually made of the supposed inextricable and almost natural linkage between civil society and democracy and democratization. Building on a growing literature attempting to problematize the inevitability of the link between civil activism and democracy or democratization, this volume offers a rather unique theoretical discussion about the meaning of civil society in addition to empirical evidence that illustrates how a more flexible definition of civil society can lead to a better understanding of how activism works under authoritarian or liberal-authoritarian constraints.
